In my opinion King Lear offers a complex presentation of catharsis. You have to weigh up for yourself whether the cruelty that King Lear experiences through the struggle in his mind and the hanging of Cordelia is justified. Also, Lear's momentary recognition of his flaws (when he wakes from his slumber) is so short that it is hard to say that he has fully learnt his lesson as he awakes from one agony to soon stumble into another.

However, it is possible to argue that catharsis does take place within characters and audience as we see Edgar say we should speak what we feel and not what we aught.